Solar power is becoming increasingly popular as a source of renewable energy. Advances in panel efficiency and manufacturing techniques have driven down the cost per kilowatt and have led to double-digit annual growth in solar installs and projections of even greater growth in the future. Solar energy's recent success notwithstanding, the solar industry must continue to innovate and reduce costs so that it can continue to offer a value proposition to its customers relative to fossil fuel based power.
Solar systems have relatively few components. The primary ones are the panels, mounting system, inverters, electrical interfaces to existing grid power, and the labor involved installation. Therefore, a reduction in any one of these will have a measurable impact on the cost per watt of solar. Solar mounting systems in particular effect not only hard costs associated with solar system, but also potentially soft costs such as labor, crew size and installation times.
Tile roofs present a unique challenge for installing photovoltaic panels as compared to shingled or composite shingle roofs, primarily because tiles are neither flat nor flexible. Also, they typically must be moved out of the way or completely removed to attach the requisite mounting hardware to the underlying roof or roof rafter to support a solar array, whereas composite shingles can simply be drilled through. Therefore, known solutions for mounting PV panels onto tiled roofs are often relatively more expensive as well as more time consuming compared to the systems used to install solar panels on shingle roofs.